Livestock confinement pens such as those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 8,186,306 and commercially available from L. T. Hampel Corporation have attained widespread usage and are well known. Such pens are made from multiple generally planar panels that are molded plastic and fit together at the corners to create a single free-standing pen or a system containing any number of pens side-to-side and/or back-to-back in generally a grid pattern. The panels are generally hollow and made by vacuum thermoforming, rotational molding, blow molding, or similar processes.
The front panel of such pens is pinned at the corners to the side panels or provided with other fastening means and contains a door that is hinged at one edge and latched to the front panel at the opposite edge. The door may contain an integrated feeding system that holds buckets of feed and water, or possibly a bottle to feed younger animals. These pens must be structurally sound, easy to set up and take down, easy to remove to clean the floor on which they stand, easy to clean, and must provide effective containment of a variety of animals.
In addition, the human user of the pen system may like to set up the pen in a variety of ways, depending upon their operation. Another important aspect of the pens and particularly the raising of young animals like calves is preventing contact between animals in neighboring pens, as such contact promotes the spread of disease. The pen should also function to inhibit cross-contamination of the feed and water that are provided in the pen door.